Tuesday, January 28, 2020

Impact of Rent Seeking

Impact of Rent Seeking What is rent seeking and what problems may it cause for society? Rent seeking is a concept which was being labelled by Anne Krueger in 1974 (Tullock, 1998). This term has been widely defined as the â€Å"political activity of individuals and groups who devote scarce resources to the pursuit of monopoly rights granted by governments† (Mitchell Munger, 1991, p. 525). From the above definitions, it has been supported by the knowledge that rent is an entirely excess payment that might be equivalent or above to the resources and helped to increase the earning power of the resource as gains are often concealed (Parker, 1996). Regarding this, it will be consider as problematic for society as, broadly, many rent-seeking activities are connected and worked closely with the government or economic structures that make a huge influence on society as a whole. As it can be expected, many theorists and social, economic and political commentators have been worked together and recognised that there are numerous problems attached to this particular system. As such, there are needs for discussion over the problem and evaluation on their relevance to society today. In this essay, it will first illustrate the concept of rent-seeking in addition with some examples in real life. Secondly, it will assess different potential problems that may cause for society by identifying issues that directly related to the negative effect which has imposed on national and international economies in similarly before evaluating them critically. Lastly, it will be summarising with a view that the problems which have identified and the importance of rent seeking that have imposed a significant impact on society and welfare and costs incurred in society must be addressed in relation to such behaviours carrying out onwards. According to the concept of rent seeking, it is not a new system or activities exist in nowadays instead it has been developed throughout past. This type of activities would be able to exist in everywhere or anytime as long as there are individuals or groups which have the power to use their resources as a tool to monopolize their market or the status, and from this they gain benefits from it but without paying back to society. Rent is a source of income that there are payments made to the owner in order to use the possession for e.g. a house, a building or anything that the borrower wants to use it but they do not have the ability or want to own the assets permanently (Smith, 2001). To illustrate this concept more precisely, there is a good example from the China economic structure. Tak-wing and Yongping (2009) has researched the economic situation of China over a period of time, and which how the rent seeking exists and leads to social conflict and problems. In China, coals are bei ng seen as highly regulated and controlled goods by the government. But, after reforming, the power to own these goods are being spread to a certain extent which they make use of this act to obtain the support their policy. Therefore, it could be shown that the concept of rent seeking could be exist in any forms over industry or society and transformed from time to time. Having a detailed definition of rent seeking, it will take a deep investigation into this concept by assessing the problems for society that are widely associated with it. To begin, rent seeking could be related to the practice of all pay auctions in society which, according to Anderson et al (1997, p. 2), are the pursuit of economic allocations for a specific prize that is founded on the basis of costly activities. Tullock (1998) has outlined the all pay auctions could caused lots of problems especially the monopolies. Although there are possibilities that waste could be avoided in some circumstances, he suggested an example that is when a weak democratic government is unable and have difficult to control the bidding process, thus ensuring that profits disperse (Tullock, 1998), which could cause a detrimental effect to society. The above argument is highly believable and trustful as it draws upon the power of the monopolies while opposing to the power of those who controlling the au ctions, which is out of proportion in different kind of cases. For this reason, there is no protection being offered for society as a whole. In fact, the above particular example has shown that wastage levels are enhanced where rent seeking occurs. With the evidence offered by Anderson et al (1997), they gave a warning that those individuals or agents who are losing out in the auction are financially worse off eventually as they do not receive any compensation for their trouble. Moreover, Kreuger (1974) stated firmly that the money spent on real resources give a consequence in the rise of annual welfare costs while it is specifically regarding to price and quality controls, which were 7% of GNP in India. In the same way, when there is intensification of economic controls related to rent seeking activity directly, the numbers of corruption has been increased as a result (Kreuger, 1974). This type of corruption can undermine the economic security of society as a whole and make the wel fare costs become worsen, thus it is giving assurance to the notion that the system is not beneficiary to society unless there are controls held in place. Furthermore, the activities of rent seeking may lead to the transitional gains trap exist in society. With reference to Tullock (1975), through the capitalisation of rental flows into fixed assets which provide a one-off benefit instead of a continuing increased rate of return, the transitional gains gap is the appearance of unprofitability in this government aid programs. This is a fairly straightforward concept but is also the one that is highly difficult to solve for society, as the benefits that are afforded companies under this condition do not pass downwards to the population, instead securing capital losses should the rent be abolished. What is more, there is an ongoing social waste linked with this phenomenon (Del Rosal, 2011). Tullock (1975) defended that under this situation, progressing reform is impossible and therefore the companies benefitting are under no risk of losing out. Certainly, this giving support to Munger’s (2006) argued that the existing system  "forecloses good competition† but the process is problematic for society undoubtedly beyond loss of competition. Lastly, the rent seeking activity may cause the problems of the balance of rent seeking between societies as it is importance of this activity. In this particular point, it is perceived as significant in encouraging processes of development (Khan Sundaram, 2000) and it has been recognised that to give support on the emergence of various economies during their development phase. Regardless of the fact that the shifts in supply and demand curves have been proved as a positive rent seeking (Tollison, 1982), the induced government action by artificial mean to acquire rents has really undermined any potential benefits. On the contrary, the existence of rent seeking can also be severely imposing harm to growth, thus this giving the policymakers with a paradox that has been observed in the developing nations in Asia, most of which experienced widespread rent seeking during the 1990s onwards (Khan Sundaram, 2000). From this specific example, it behaves according to the standard of the theo retical principle that economic growth performing badly, thus putting the poorest into a situation that is even deeper into poverty while the organised and beneficial groups employed the state power to increase their own economic benefits directly (Pasour, 1987). Indeed, Tullock (1967) has noted that there are extensive welfare costs being attached with the implementation of all procedures that related to the rent seeking of monopolies and tariffs, and the application of this principle onto this example shows that social costs not only retard the process of growth but can actually reverse it and lead to the shrinking of the economy through a remarkable losses. Therefore for the effect, the problematic dilemma that exist between the harm and good to developing nations in particular cause an attention of the damaging nature of rent seeking. To conclude, the above problems of rent seeking undoubtedly have imposed an impact on society which attached wastage in every instance and hindered the growth and competition. All pay auctions may leads to corruption and intensify the wastage that was produced throughout the process. Also, the transitional gap and the balancing of the importance and damage of rent seeking for economies brought problematic to society as the former did not benefits to the society and the latter needs to make one’s choice over the good and harm. Under all the possible problems that may cause from this activity, action from the government must be balanced continually in long term if issues like the waste caused by monopolies and tariffs are to be solved. Even though it is approved that Tullock is right in that as rent seeking deep-rooted into economic culture, thus reform is impossible and there are solutions that the government should solved over such problem in order to prevent further economic damage.

Monday, January 20, 2020

Producing Your Own Play :: Theatre Drama Personal Narratives Acting Essays

Producing Your Own Play Recently, two friends and I structured a piece of theatre involving three characters and their journey through life. Throughout the play themes such, alcohol abuse, child abuse, drug addiction and many other themes showing the mental ability as the characters come across hard dissions during their journey through life. The play is about three characters who are faced with many temptations in which all resulting in some sort of addiction and later resulting in the character ending up in a mental hospital. The play is fast moving and perceptive entertains and thought provoking, funny yet ultimately tragic. Throughout the planning of our production we came across a few difficult disicions, one that really stands out in my mind was how to show the audience a sub-consion veiw of the characters thoughts, we wanted to really show the depth of these characters giving the veiwer the ability to understand the characters choices. To enable this we decided to use fiction in certain scenes showing an angel and a devil both giving adive to each indivdual character. We wanted to give the play a theme of 'Black Comedy' this keeping the audience more intreaged. My partners and I decided we could create our own characters, I decided that when my character first enters the play aged 9 years old I wanted to play this child to the best of my ability, I found this difficult at first for I had never played a character who was suffering with child abuse. After thinking about how I would play my character I decided that to give the veiwer a deep insite of my characters thoughts to acomplish this I tried to come across as a very insicure child, growing up with no love or affection in his life, this suggesting I would keep my voice in a quiet pitch and also while my character grows older and discovers he is a free person he still is traped with his father torment constant in his mind, this resulting in him turning into a more visiuos man with a very controversal veiw upon women this veiw growing into an addiction, growing to the ecstent wher the only pleasure was when he would kill women; '' GRABBING EVERY WOMEN IN SIGHT INTO DARK ALLYS LATE AT NIGHT'', in certain scenes we used ryme to give a stronger affect.Later on in the play my character finds himself in a mental hospital, my characters mind was no loger stable and useing very simular insicure body language like when I was a child I tried to give an affet where I was trabbed in my childhood

Sunday, January 12, 2020

Bmw Films Essay

The primary issue faced by Jim McDowell is what to do for his next marketing campaign. He will need to decide what direction BMW will take in order to stay current in the target market and position the brand as the leader in the luxury car industry. A sub issue that Jim is facing is that in order for BMW to stand out compare to the competition, it must be at the forefront of the marketing trend. There is always pressure on innovative marketing campaigns as a bad campaign can lead to severe damage in the company image and reputation. Decision Alternatives. There are a number of alternatives that Jim faces when deciding in what direction to move with the BMW marketing campaign. Develop more short films and build a big series out of it. Develop a full length movie for the theatres Do nothing to the existing campaign and move on to develop a new campaign To continue to use the existing BMW films plus developing a new campaign Creating new films on the heels of the original films plus developing a new campaign Develop a full length movie plus developing a new campaign In order to decide the best alternative it is important to look at some key decision criteria. In this case the important factors would be: delivery time, risk, cost, competitive advantage, ease of implementation. Analysis of Industry In the luxury car segment, BMW and Mercedes have stand strong against the strong competition from Japan like Acura, Lexus, Infiniti. In year 2001, BMW is second best luxury car seller, just behind Lexus amount the other ten major luxury brands. However, BMW only ranked 8th in media expenditures, which again proved the great success on their innovative campaign. In terms of customer loyalty, luxury brand customers do tend to stay among the top brands and are very loyal. There are always customers who switch from BMW to Mercedes or the other way around. Since BMW has the competitive advantage of a younger clientele, it is very important for BMW to create marketing campaign to young adult so they can look forward to own a BMW when they can afford one. Analysis of Company Evaluation of Alternatives Alternative #1, 2, and 3 should only be considered as a short term alternative that can achieve quick beneficial results with no long term prospects because all the alternatives evolve around the same film concept, which eventually will wear out and target audience will not be interested in it anymore. Alternative #4 takes into account with BMW’s long term goal, to be the leader in the industry with innovative campaigns. However, developing a new concept takes time and research before implementation, therefore some immediate alternatives needs to be done before the new campaign kicks in. Alternative #5, 6, or 7 will achieve that goal. Alternative #5 Introduce the BMW films to new markets that may have missed the online films during the campaign period will enable BMW to entice an entirely new segment. By showing the films throughother mediums, BMW will be able to reach a wider audience plus raising the brand awareness. Since this campaign is so successful and unique, BMW can also produce DVD and make itas a collectible item. This alternative is easy to implement, low cost to run, low risk as the campaign is already running with huge success with good reputation. However, other companies may copy the idea and there is a chance that BMW will lose its competitive advantage as the films are getting overly exposed to the original audiences that BMW targeted during the initial campaign period. Therefore, developing another campaign while this is running is necessary in order to achieve BMW’s long term marketing goal. Alternative #6 The other option would be to follow up with another series of films on the heels of the original films. BMW would want to keep the number of films low to try and blend them into the successful original films and not to market them as another series of short films. This alternative will require some time to prepare, and the cost will be much higher in comparison to Alternative #5, which will make it harder as BMW will need more resources in creating a new campaign at the same time. It is easy to implement as all the ground works are in place from the previous films. However, this alternative will have a higher risk than other options due to the high anticipation of BMW to produce high quality films. If any of the film receives negative feedbacks, BMW will risk losing out on the campaign inwhole, plus the reputation of the series. BMW will still keep its competitive advantage with this alternative as they are still the one who leads the marketing trend. Alternative #7 Creating a full length movie can be the next big campaignfor BMW. It is a new approach and will make the brand stand out of all others. The target audience is also much wider in comparison to the initial campaign. It will take a long time to implement, and not as easy as short films because a full length film is more complicated in terms of plot and production. The cost will also go veryhigh that may use up all of BMW’s resources in marketing. It is a two sided sword because if BMW is not placed enough in the film there is no difference in doing product placement in the James Bond movie series; meanwhile if BMW is overly exposed in the film it may create negative feedbacks as it will look like an hour long commercial. The interest level of audience will also be much lower in watching a long commercial than a short film. Decision Criteria Chart Here is the chart for the best 3 alternatives: (X? low score, XXX? high score) Recommendation Based on the analysis above it is evident that the appropriate course of action is to utilize the existing movies in the short term while developing a new full scale marketing plan in the background. By utilizing the existing films BMW will be able to quickly get to market films that they have already completed. They will ride the coat tails of the internet marketing, however by introducing the films to another target markets, BMW will hopefully build on the impact created by the original films. There is relatively low risk to this model because BMW has already invested in the films and by using different mediums to convey their message it is likely that an entirely new market segment will appreciate the films as the original audience did. Although the potential payback may not as great as some off the wall innovative idea, the concept behind releasing the films to a different audience should allow more time and resources to develop another new campaign. If there are enough resources, BMW can also consider creating 1 or 2 more films to avoid losing the competitive advantage toward the target audience.

Friday, January 3, 2020

Native Americans Use Storytelling not Written Language

In the tradition of Native American culture, there is no custom of written records of personal life or tribal history. Even though they have written language, the major way to record history is by oral storytelling. Those stories focus more about creation time, tribal and family history rather than individual life. Recording autobiography from different Native American tribes is a convention way for anthropologists to preserve the Indian traditions, which gradually decline and lost after Native American contact with Western culture. Moreover, the autobiographies of Native American individuals also fulfill the public curiosity about their culture. Nevertheless, the culture differences create the confusion and misunderstand in the written records. For the people does not familiar, and understand the Indian cosmology, the autobiography provides us as a tool to reveal the secret veil of Native American. 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